Coal Burning Stopped Global Warming

Coal burning stopped global warming, according to an article in PNAS 5 July 2011, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1102467108, also reported by Reuters 5 July. Researchers from Boston and Harvard Universities, USA and University of Turku, Finland have sought to explain why the earth did not warm over the decade from 1998 to 2008, in spite of rising carbon dioxide levels. They begin their abstract with this admission: “Given the widely noted increase in the warming effects of rising greenhouse gas concentrations, it has been unclear why global surface temperatures did not rise between 1998 and 2008.” The researchers noted during this time there was a decrease in solar radiation and cyclical shift from an El Niño pattern to a La Niña climate pattern, but they concluded that the cooling effect came mainly from an increase in coal burning, mainly in China, which produced more sulphurous emissions. They also suggest “The post 1970 period of warming, which constitutes a significant portion of the increase in global surface temperature since the mid-20th century, is driven by efforts to reduce air pollution in general and acid deposition in particular, which cause sulphur emissions to decline while the concentration of greenhouse gases continues to rise.”

Editorial Comment: The decade in question was replete with dire warnings of catastrophic global warming due to increasing man-made carbon dioxide, but as these researchers admit in a mainstream, peer reviewed scientific journal, there was no warming between 1998 and 2008. There has been no more warming since then either. If these researchers’ conclusions are correct, what a dilemma for the environmentalists! They loudly proclaim we must do whatever it takes to stop global warming, but they can hardly promote increasing chemical pollution.

The solution to the problem is stop thinking that human activity warms and cools the earth, and therefore we can control the climate. As the researchers admit, solar radiation decreased and ocean currents changed during the decade of their study, but we cannot control these. Climate researchers, environmentalists and politicians need to humble themselves and admit the earth’s climate is under the control of the Creator God who does control the sun and the oceans. They can then put their efforts into doing the things we can control, such as cleaning up chemical pollution, planting trees, and other things that are good stewardship of the earth. (Ref. climate, politics, weather)